Dreams and struggles and toy boxes

In early 2006 we were faced with situations that threatened to overwhelm us. We had two little boys almost two years old who were at the developmental age of a 6 month old. We had an unbelievably strong willed little boy almost three years old. I was working full time for a parachurch organization and our support level was less than $1,000 a month. Hannah was at work as a server nearly every moment I wasn’t in the office. Our finances were in the toilet considering all we were up against, including a 21 year old who could eat his weight in Oreos every day. To top it all off the ministry was undergoing a restructuring that completely changed my job description and position within the ministry.

Hannah and I spent so much time on our knees pleading for some answers. We felt like we were called to serve in this ministry but felt like all odds were stacked against us. I was troubled because I felt like most of the things that had originally appealed to me about the ministry were being changed during the restructuring, so the ministry I had originally felt called to no longer existed. The job I was hired to do was changing, and although I was capable of performing the new duties, it wasn’t what I had moved my family halfway across the country to do.

I was on the phone regularly with all of my friends and mentors crying out for advice and guidance. Some wanted me to jump ship and move back to MO. Others encouraged me to stick it out and wait to see what God had planned. I sat down with the ministry president to share my concerns. It didn’t really go as I had intended. I wanted to talk about the change in the ministry and the new direction that we were being led and he heard nothing from me but that I was too broke to continue working there. He told me that every employee who had left the ministry had done so because of money. I explained that although money was a concern for us we believed that God would provide for us. Our main concern lay in the new direction of the ministry and that most of the employees had no say in the matter. He reiterated his point about the money.

As difficult as the entire ordeal was for us, God used it for His glory is many different ways. Our home church had decided not to support us financially even though I had been licensed and ordained in that church. Through a series of events the leadership of the church was deeply convicted for their lack of support for the missionaries going out from their church. My father-in-law knew of our financial struggles and set a meeting with the leadership of the church intent on setting them straight with the error of their ways. Before he could even open his mouth, they told him that they had been shown their errors and were in the process of preparing the first check for us. We were in an awkward position. The new support brought us to a monthly level that we could live on, but we had all but decided that it was time for me to resign. I struggled with how to say, “Thanks so much, but now we don’t need it.” Fortunately, that church now fully supports several missionaries both local and abroad. God used our struggle to change the heart of a church for His glory and for that reason alone if no other I can look back on our time in TN as a success.

With great difficulty I formed a letter of resignation from my position as events coordinator and placed a copy in the box of my HR manager and department head. I knew that the next month would be difficult as I passed all my responsibility and work load to my coworkers feeling both a sense of loss for all the opportunity and guilty for no longer being able to carry my share of the load. During my exit interview I received great encouragement from our HR manager when she told me that we were the only employees who had done everything necessary to raise their support and it didn’t work. Everyone who had failed at support raising before us had simply not done the work, but even though we did all that was asked and more, the support just wasn’t there. That really helped me to feel like it wasn’t simply a failure, but a true opportunity and I wanted to have gleaned as much wisdom and experience from it as I possibly could.

So there we were miles and miles from friends and family, without employ and feeling pretty close to hopeless. I started doing odd jobs for people in our church. Somehow we were connected with a local consignment shop that had need of children’s furniture. Something possessed me to believe that I was qualified to produce, so with our last cash one week I went to the local Home Depot and bought a van full of raw materials. Three toddler beds, two table and chair sets, and 10 toy boxes later JT Furniture & Carpentry was born. I knew I’d probably never have a ‘normal’ job again. If our life wasn’t weird enough before, it was on it’s way to becoming completely stupid.